Integrating Behavioral Health & Primary Care: Colocation Breaks Down Patient Resistance

Integrating Behavioral Health & Primary Care: Colocation Breaks Down Patient Resistance

Integrating Behavioral Health & Primary Care:
Colocation Breaks Down Patient Resistance

Behavioral health conditions affect nearly one of five Americans, leading to healthcare costs of $57 billion yearly, notes a 2009 AHRQ brief. Integration of behavioral and physical health services helps to insure access by all individuals to preventive, ongoing and appropriate behavioral health services as part of a whole-person healthcare approach.

According to 2015 metrics from the Healthcare Intelligence Network (HIN), 62 percent of healthcare organizations have integrated behavioral health and primary care to some degree, with nearly one third—31 percent—reporting they have achieved "close collaboration onsite in a partly integrated system," one of six integration levels defined by the Center for Integrative Health Solutions (CIHS).

The greatest benefit from integrated care is easy access to behavioral health providers, say numerous respondents to HIN's 2015 survey on Integrating Behavioral Health and Primary Care. Their on-site presence facilitates everything from daily huddles of psychologists and primary care physicians for reviewing candidates for behavioral health interventions to warm hand-offs by doctors who schedule patients with behavioral health at the end of a primary care appointment.

Colocation also helps to break down patient resistance and reduce the stigma associated with seeking behavioral health services. One respondent stated the physical presence of a psychologist in the primary care office increased patients' willingness to engage with a behavioral health professional.

When colocation isn't possible, telehealth can help to fill the gaps. Twenty-one percent of respondents conduct behavioral health consults via telehealth.

"Psychiatrists and independently licensed practitioners are hard to find in our rural area," said a respondent. "Telehealth is consistently used to meet demand, often with staff sitting in "live" with the member."

For more information on 2015 Healthcare Benchmarks: Integrating Behavioral Health and Primary Care or to reserve your copy today, please visit:
http://store.hin.com/product.asp?itemid=5057
Available for shipping in August 19th.

This 40-page report, based on responses by 113 healthcare organizations to HIN's inaugural industry survey on this emerging trend, compiles a wealth of metrics on current and planned integration, levels of integration achieved, program components, screening tools, challenges, impacts and successes.

Supported with dozens of graphs and tables, these 2015 market metrics capture trends in integration of behavioral health and primary care, including the impact of integration on population health and organizational metrics.

Breaking down findings by high-responding industry sectors, this report includes the following data points:

  • Prevalence of integrated programs;
  • Level of behavioral and physical health integration achieved, as defined by the Collaborative Family Health Care Association;
  • Use of telehealth for behavioral health consults;
  • Populations served by integrated programs;
  • Behavioral health screening tools used in integrated programs;
  • Program components, including metrics on peer support, substance abuse treatment, Medicaid health homes, case management, and more;
  • Healthcare professionals belonging to the integrated care team;
  • Most effective tools, workflows or protocols in integrated programs, in respondents' own words;
  • Greatest challenges and successes of integrating behavioral health with primary care;
  • Details on planned program integrations;
  • The complete June 2015 Integrating Behavioral Health and Primary Care survey tool;
and much more.

Reserve your copy today online:
http://store.hin.com/product.asp?itemid=5057

This benchmark report is designed to meet business and planning needs of health plans, employers, managed care organizations, physician organizations, health systems, and health coaching, disease management, behavioral health, case management and health IT companies and others by providing critical benchmarks in care coordination of patients with chronic illness.

This report is part of the HIN Healthcare Benchmarking series, which provides continuous qualitative data on industry trends to empower healthcare companies to assess strengths, weaknesses and opportunities to improve by comparing organizational performance to reported metrics.

If you are already a Healthcare Benchmark series member, then this report is FREE for you.

Available in Single or Multi-User Licenses

A multi-user license will provide you with the right to install and use this information on your company's computer network for an unlimited number of additional workstations within your organization for a one-time fee. To have this valuable resource on your network, or to inquire about ordering bulk copies in print or Adobe PDF, please e-mail sales@hin.com or call 888-446-3530.

P.S. -- You may also be interested in these resources: